I was hoping someone could tell me if what I plan to do is possible using Arduino.

A friend of mine is a photographer who was wanting to be able to roll a camera along linear motion bearings (approx length: 1500mm) taking photos at varies instances along its length. The speed at which the camera moves needs to be variable as well as the number of photos taken along its length. For example a photo might want to be taken every 50mm taking 3 seconds to travel that distance.

To do this I was going to use linear motion bearings and rails, belt driven using a stepper motor. The tricky part for me will be the software controlling it. I understand you can control a stepper motor using Arduino hardware. I want the HMI (human machine interface) to be as simplistic as possible. I want the speed to be controlled by a simple knob that can be turned from 0-100%. Likewise for the distance between photos.

I hope that explains it well enough. Is this possible using Arduino as well as for someone that hasn't programmed anything before (other than CNC G-Code).

and see; http://yourduino.com/camera-control.htm The software for that is here: http://www.mindspring.com/~tom2000/Projects/AI-1_Remote/AI-1_Remote.htmlI think the AI-1 software is a great place to start and it has lots of memory space left in an Arduino.

AND to blow your mind about the possibilities of this stuff:http://timescapes.org/

I'm using the Bescor MP101 to pan my DSLR. I wrote a library to slow down the motion so that it takes a video frame every 2 pixels while it's panning in HD. Another to take a still image every 1/8 degree, with an arbitrary time between shots. This is only a few pixels at 18mm. Another to make Gigapixel images like the expensive unit they sell. With Uno the possibilities are endless!